General / Off-Topic Bill Gates loses 1.3 Billion
- Thread starter Oddball
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I've always had a soft spot for Bill ever since this article:
http://www.theonion.com/article/bill-gates-grants-self-18-dexterity-20-charisma-837
I doubt that he even noticed that loss. Seriously, this guy has so much money he doesn't "have" money, he "is" money.
His charitable endowment alone is worth 30 billion dollars. I don't know what he's worth now, but back in 1994 I remember reading an article that claimed he was worth 104 billion dollars. I know it's less now but dang....
So I went and read that article.
I'm such a nerd that my only reaction to it was "huh, they based that on third edition. That was a terrible edition of D&D."
An association with the fall of the stock markets ?
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Aww. Third is only surpassed by 2nd edition in my opinion. And only just - thAC0 was horrible. 4th is terrible. 5th doesn't seem quite so bad, but still not great.
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I still play first. I've run the same world for 20+ years. THAC0 is just very simple maths, I never understood why people hated it.
1e - a good role playing game. The DM runs the game.
2e - a good role playing game with approximately 38 too many splat books. The DM still runs the game.
3e - a poor role playing game, but lots of crunch for video gamers and people without imaginations. The DM has much less control over the game thanks to too much codification of rules and systems.
4e - a fun board game, hopeless for anything else. Combats can take hours, DMs have absolutely no control over the game and become mere "narrators" to the players running around and being heroic. Very sad.
5e - an okay role playing game. Too much stuff is codified and not enough left to imagination, but at least they put in place strong backing for the DM to change whatever (s)he wants. A good step in the right direction.
1eWFRP - Everyone should actually be playing this because it's so much better than anything. Also, John Blanche.
(Is it possible to go too far off topic in an off topic thread? Hmm.)
let me push this a little further off topic, Fallout the P&P version:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamma_World
WHAT?!! I LOVED 3E's d20 system, was superfast to run with. We moved our gameworld from 2E to 3E and overall we were pretty happy with it.
I think our affair might be over Julissa...
Roll a d20 + 4.
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Curses! I rolled a seven, leaving me a total of eleven. But if we have to split up, I'm keeping the beach house to start that bacon sorority I always talked about. You can have the family anaconda.
You mean the snake don't you? Not the ship.
To be honest I think our campaign world went over pretty well because our GM was actually focused on story. We relied on dice only in combat or when we were doing something outrageous (like giving a speech, which we actually had to give then roll to see how it went down, bonus points for actually giving a good speech) and 3E was good for that in the hands of a good GM. We never bothered with miniatures or maps, always story. Well maps sometimes so we had a rough idea how everyone was placed, but that was about it.
Well of course. An anaconda makes the perfect companion for a newborn.
The advantage of a good DM can turn any system into a good game - but a great system can help a good DM make something really, really astonishing. Or it can help terrible DMs not fall into the devious and wicked traps set by players. I find that last bit particularly useful!
Bringing this back on topic-ish ...
What annoys me about people who have stupid amounts of money, like Bill Gates, if I contacted him and asked nicely if he'd give me a million dollars, an amount, while a lot of money to me, is to him, like a £1 (or a $1) to me, his reaction/reply to me would be "Why should I give you a million dollars?". Of course that's a very good reply, and he'd be very justified to ask that, but I mean, come on, he's got a stupid amount of money he'll never be able to spend (though I do hear Warren Buffet is making a really good effort at spending & giving it all away before he dies) and Bill's children & grandchildren & great-grandchildren will never be able to spend ... a million would be something he'd not even notice.
In a world where 5% have more money than the other 95%, hoarding it like that, really annoys me (and why I respect Warren Buffet more than Bill Gates, even though Warren won't give me a million dollars either
).
EDIT: The really ironic thing is, if I did get a million dollars (or pound sterling), I wouldn't spend it either ... but I would spend the interest it'd make in the bank.
What annoys me about people who have stupid amounts of money, like Bill Gates, if I contacted him and asked nicely if he'd give me a million dollars, an amount, while a lot of money to me, is to him, like a £1 (or a $1) to me, his reaction/reply to me would be "Why should I give you a million dollars?". Of course that's a very good reply, and he'd be very justified to ask that, but I mean, come on, he's got a stupid amount of money he'll never be able to spend (though I do hear Warren Buffet is making a really good effort at spending & giving it all away before he dies) and Bill's children & grandchildren & great-grandchildren will never be able to spend ... a million would be something he'd not even notice.
In a world where 5% have more money than the other 95%, hoarding it like that, really annoys me (and why I respect Warren Buffet more than Bill Gates, even though Warren won't give me a million dollars either
).EDIT: The really ironic thing is, if I did get a million dollars (or pound sterling), I wouldn't spend it either ... but I would spend the interest it'd make in the bank.
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Thems fighting words!
It is simple math but it's needless. With THAC0 the math is THAC0-AC = roll to hit. With D20 it's just Roll+BAB >= AC. One has the unintuitive AC getting lower being better while higher roll is better. The other is just the same thing rearranged with higher values being better all over. THAC0 is deliberately obtuse for no gain whatsoever.
WOW! I totally missed that on first read. I need to set my forum switch to "casual" ��
Bringing this back on topic-ish ...
What annoys me about people who have stupid amounts of money, like Bill Gates, if I contacted him and asked nicely if he'd give me a million dollars, an amount, while a lot of money to me, is to him, like a £1 (or a $1) to me, his reaction/reply to me would be "Why should I give you a million dollars?". Of course that's a very good reply, and he'd be very justified to ask that, but I mean, come on, he's got a stupid amount of money he'll never be able to spend (though I do hear Warren Buffet is making a really good effort at spending & giving it all away before he dies) and Bill's children & grandchildren & great-grandchildren will never be able to spend ... a million would be something he'd not even notice.
In a world where 5% have more money than the other 95%, hoarding it like that, really annoys me (and why I respect Warren Buffet more than Bill Gates, even though Warren won't give me a million dollars either
EDIT: The really ironic thing is, if I did get a million dollars (or pound sterling), I wouldn't spend it either ... but I would spend the interest it'd make in the bank.
He isn't a hoarder Al. Have a look at what his foundation does: http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Who-We-Are/General-Information/Foundation-Factsheet
I couldn't think of a better way to help others if I was in his shoes. This ginger-haired King Of Nerds is helping to save lives.
Bringing this back on topic-ish ...
What annoys me about people who have stupid amounts of money, like Bill Gates, if I contacted him and asked nicely if he'd give me a million dollars, an amount, while a lot of money to me, is to him, like a £1 (or a $1) to me, his reaction/reply to me would be "Why should I give you a million dollars?". Of course that's a very good reply, and he'd be very justified to ask that, but I mean, come on, he's got a stupid amount of money he'll never be able to spend (though I do hear Warren Buffet is making a really good effort at spending & giving it all away before he dies) and Bill's children & grandchildren & great-grandchildren will never be able to spend ... a million would be something he'd not even notice.
In a world where 5% have more money than the other 95%, hoarding it like that, really annoys me (and why I respect Warren Buffet more than Bill Gates, even though Warren won't give me a million dollars either
EDIT: The really ironic thing is, if I did get a million dollars (or pound sterling), I wouldn't spend it either ... but I would spend the interest it'd make in the bank.
Can I please have $1?